The Judas Window

Under cover of the noise, Evelyn whispered excitedly:

'Ken, H.M. is going to bring it off. I tell you I know it! That re-examination was weak. It sounded well, but it was weak; he shouldn't have brought up that business about dust on the backs of pictures. Of course there's dust on the backs of pictures, oodles of it. I was looking at the women on the jury, and I could tell what they were thinking. A little thing like that arrow would have been dusty all over unless it had been absolutely flat on the wall. Can't you feel that they're not certain at all now?'

'Ss - t! Quiet!'

The judge was looking at the clock while the clerk's sonorous voice rose:

'Members of the jury, when the prisoner was before the magistrates, he was asked if he had anything to say in answer to the charge; and being told that he need not say anything, but that if he did it would be taken down in writing and used in evidence at his trial, he said: 'I plead not guilty to the charge made against me, and I am advised to reserve my defence. Through this charge I have lost everything in life that was of any value to me; so do what you like; but I am still not guilty. That is all I have to say.''

'If Sir Henry has no objections’ said Mr Justice Rankin briskly, 'we will adjourn the court until to- morrow.'

Bumping, shuffling, we all got to our feet as the judge rose.

'All persons who have anything more to do before my Lords the King's Justices of Oyer and Terminer, and general gaol delivery for the jurisdiction of the Central Criminal Court' - the rain was pattering steadily on the glass roof; it was the tired hour when you think of cocktails - 'may depart hence and give their attendance here again to-morrow, at ten-thirty o'clock.'

'God Save the King, and my Lords the King's Justices.'

Again the pause broke. The judge turned round, and went stumping along behind the bench at his brisk and pigeon-toed walk. Court-room Number One broke up into individuals, all with lives and thoughts of their own, moving round hats and homes. Someone yawned audibly, and then a voice spoke suddenly with great distinctness:

'Watch him, Joe!'

It came with a shock. We all turned round at the commotion in the dock. The two warders bad sprung forward with their hands on the shoulders of the prisoner. Nearly at the trap leading down into the cells, Answell had turned round and walked swiftly towards the rail again. We heard his footsteps rap on that dance-floor which, has been polished by the feet of so many now dead. But he did not attempt any action. He stood with his hands on the edge of the dock, and spoke with fierce clarity. To hear his voice was like hearing a deaf-and-dumb man speak.

'What's the use of going on with this? That piece of feather broke off the arrow when I stabbed him. I killed the old swine, and I admit it; so let's get this over with and call it a day.'

IX

'Red Robes Without Hurry'

IF anybody had asked me what would probably happen in case of a commotion like this, I should have thought of every contingency except what really happened. We all looked at the judge, since the prisoner was speaking to him. By this time Mr Justice Rankin had nearly reached the door, at the right-hand side behind the bench, by which he entered and left. For perhaps a tenth of a second his brisk step hesitated. For perhaps a tenth of a second he turned his head slightly, with a blank gaze of deafness and non-recognition. Then his red robes - without any hurry - disappeared through the door, and it closed behind his tie-wig.

He 'had not heard' the words which the prisoner, with fierce distinctness, was shouting across that void. So we did not hear them either. Like a room of mutes we bent to gather up our hats, our umbrellas, our parcels; we shuffled our papers, and looked at the floor, and pretended to say something to the person beside us ...

'My God, won't anybody listen to me? Don't you hear what I'm saying? You - listen -' The jury were going out on sheep-fashion, and not one of them looked round, except one scared woman who was touched on the arm by their guardian. 'Please, for God's sake listen to me I killed him; I'm admitting it; I want you to -'

The soothing mutter of the warder droned. 'All right, my lad; all right; down here; easy does it; take him easy, Joe - ce - easy –‘

Answell stopped, and seemed to be looking from one warder to the other. Our glances did not go higher than the buttons of his waistcoat, yet you had an impression that he felt more trapped now than he had ever been before. His eyes looked hot and puzzled when they hauled him across to the trap.

'But listen! - wait, I don't want to go - no; wait a bit -I - aren't they going to listen to me? I admit it, d'ye hear?'

'Sure, my lad; plenty of time, e-easy there; mind that step -'

We went out in good order, leaving a dead schoolroom full of yellow furniture, and we did not comment. Lolly-pop, looking white, made a sign to me which I interpreted as: 'Downstairs'; I could not see H.M.in the crowd. They began to switch out the lights. A sort of network of shuffling whispers caught us all together.

Someone said in my ear: '- and all over but the hanging.'

'I know,' muttered another voice. 'And yet, for a couple of seconds there, I almost thought -'

'That he mightn't have done it?'

'I don't know: not exactly: and yet -'

Outside Evelyn and I conferred. 'They're probably right,' she admitted; 'and I don't feel so well. I say, I've got to go, Ken. I promised Sylvia to be there at six-thirty. Are you coming?'

'No, I've got a message for H.M. Simply 'yes' from the Hume girl. I'll wait.'

Evelyn drew her fur coat closer. 'I don't want to stay now. Oh, blast it all, Ken; why did we have to come here? That - that cooks his goose, rather, doesn't it?'

'Depends on whether it's evidence, and apparently it isn't.'

'Oh, evidence -!' said Evelyn contemptuously. 'Bother evidence I What would you have felt if you had been on that jury? That's what counts. I wish we hadn't come here; I wish we'd never even heard of the case! What is the girl like? No, don't tell me. I don't want to know. That last business - G'bye, darling. See you later.'

She hurried away into the rain, and I was left glowering in the crowd. People were scuttling like chickens at the door of the Old Bailey, though the rain had almost ceased. There was a now-we're-out-of-school look about it. A bitter wind whisked round the corner of the building, and the lines of gas-lamps in Newgate Street were palely solemn. Among the crush of cars waiting for their dignitaries I found H.M.'s closed Vauxhall (not a certain Lanchester of weird memory), with his chauffeur Luigi. I leaned on the car and tried to smoke a cigarette against the wind. Memories were strong to-night. Up there, past St Sepulchre's Church, ran Giltspur Street: off Giltspur Street was Plague Court, among whose ghosts H.M. and I had walked some years ago: and at that time there had been no thought of murder in James Caplon Answell's mind. The crowd from the Old Bailey thinned slowly. After a general shooting of bolts had begun, a couple of City-of-London policemen - with their humped helmets like firemen's hats in blue cloth - came out and looked the situation over. H.M. was almost the last to leave. He came stumping out with his own unwieldy top-hat stuck on the back of his head, his overcoat with the moth-eaten fur collar flying out behind; and I could tell by the profane movements of his lips that he had been having a talk with Answell.

He pushed me into the car.

'Grub,' H.M. said succinctly. He added: 'Oh, my eye, the young assl That's torn it.' 'So he's really guilty after all?'

'Guilty? No. Not him. He was only bein' a decent young feller. I got to get him out of this, Ken,' said H.M. sombrely. 'He's worth saving.'

A passing car, as we turned into Newgate Street, merely brushed our mudguard; and H.M. leaned out of the window and cursed with such resonance and imaginativeness that it was an index to his state of mind.

'I suppose,' H.M. went on, 'he thought he'd only got to come out and confess, and the judge would say: 'O.K., son, that's enough; take him out and string him up,' straightaway, d'ye see?'

'But why confess? And, anyway, is it evidence?'

H.M.'s attitude towards this was much like Evelyn's. 'Of course it ain't evidence. The point is the effect it's goin' to have, even if old Balmy Rankin tells 'em to disregard it. I got great faith in Balmy, Ken ... But did I hear you thinking the worst is over when the Crown gets -through with its evidence? Son, our troubles haven't begun. It's the cross-examination of Answell that I'm dreadin’. You ever hear Walt Storm cross-examine? He takes 'era to pieces